EV (electric vehicle) News and Discussion

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#2625274 22-Dec-2020 08:59

Geektastic: It’s really quite straightforward: once EVs are available that are no less convenient than current ice vehicles to charge, have as many useful variants and cost similar amounts, people will happily swap.
Until that time, it’s going to be a niche for early adopters and/or the well off.

Hydrogen is probably more practical in many ways for many users.

I can’t see NZ significantly adopting either in less than 25 years.

I think its a bit more generous than that

Its far more convenient to charge at home than stop at a gas station. On a trip I would bring the lunch stop to coincide with the charge stop

They can cost more, but if the general public evaluate the time it will take to recover the premium from fuel savings, and that's say 3 years or so, that's enough

Factor in levies on ICE/fuel to subsidise EV, that narrows the gap as well

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#2625289 22-Dec-2020 09:30

Geektastic:
Hydrogen is probably more practical in many ways for many users.

Except for all the ways it's terrible -

Production uses huge amounts of energy and (currently) starts with fossil fuels. Industrial-scale electrolysis will happen but so will better batteries
Long distance transport of hydrogen requires a brand new national network of pipes. The grid to transport electricity is already there, just needing moderate expansion over the years
Storage of useful amounts either requires super high pressure
- A high-pressure hydrogen tank is a bomb waiting to go off even without the fact that hydrogen is highly explosive in its own right
- High-pressure hydrogen reacts with everything to create hydrides, and iron hydride is not a structurally sound material to be making high pressure tanks out of
- Filling requires connectors and hoses that are strong enough to take super high pressure yet flexible enough to bend and reliable enough for a bogan to fill the tank without blowing up the entire neighbourhood
or super cold
- Insulated tanks are very bulky
- Fuel still boils off so your full tank on Friday night is empty Monday morning
- Filling requires connectors and hoses that are flexible at -250 degrees and reliable enough for a bogan to fill the tank without turning themselves into a popsicle

In short, hydrogen is likely to be more useful at industrial scale as on-site storage at a renewable generator site as a preference to batteries because there will be no bogans trying to blow everything up. Other than some special purpose vehicles or possibly long distance airliners (where the bulk of the fuel is burnt off on take-off and the plane is not expected to land with a full tank anyway so boil-off is much less of a problem) batteries will always have the advantage until there is a fundamental breakthrough in hydrogen storage.

Bulk battery technology is mostly an engineering problem now; bulk hydrogen is still waiting for basic science.

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#2625291 22-Dec-2020 09:32

tdgeek:
Geektastic: It’s really quite straightforward: once EVs are available that are no less convenient than current ice vehicles to charge, have as many useful variants and cost similar amounts, people will happily swap.
Until that time, it’s going to be a niche for early adopters and/or the well off.

Hydrogen is probably more practical in many ways for many users.

I can’t see NZ significantly adopting either in less than 25 years.

I think its a bit more generous than that

Its far more convenient to charge at home than stop at a gas station. On a trip I would bring the lunch stop to coincide with the charge stop

They can cost more, but if the general public evaluate the time it will take to recover the premium from fuel savings, and that's say 3 years or so, that's enough

Factor in levies on ICE/fuel to subsidise EV, that narrows the gap as well

Imagine all those people stopping for lunch when there’s 3 million EVs....

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#2625292 22-Dec-2020 09:35

Geektastic:

Imagine all those people stopping for lunch when there’s 3 million EVs....

True... I guess at the moment no one stops for lunch anywhere... /s

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#2625298 22-Dec-2020 09:46

tdgeek:

Geektastic:

Imagine all those people stopping for lunch when there’s 3 million EVs....

True... I guess at the moment no one stops for lunch anywhere... /s

I sense a business opportunity.

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#2625317 22-Dec-2020 09:53

SaltyNZ:

tdgeek:

True... I guess at the moment no one stops for lunch anywhere... /s

I sense a business opportunity.

See my post #2616663 on the GridServe installation in the UK.

https://www.harmlesssolutions.co.nz/

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#2625342 22-Dec-2020 10:03

HarmLessSolutions:

See my post #2616663 on the GridServe installation in the UK.

Oh yes, it's long been obvious to me (or indeed to anyone who stops to think about it for 2 seconds) that the current highway services sites aren't going anywhere - they can adapt. All they need to do is install some moderate-speed chargers in the car parks which are free if you buy lunch (e.g. get a code when you pay) as well as a few super high speed ones which are always paid for. As battery ranges increase the need for a very large recharge decreases; if you can already drive for 400km then you really should be stopping for a decent break for safety reasons anyway.

Done all at once it would be a huge investment, but luckily they have plenty of time to plan and execute, as long as they actually do so. If they wait then ChargeNet will eat their lunch, so to speak. Hec, if it comes to that they could just partner with ChargeNet and split the costs.

The ones that will die off are the local service stations. Service stations in suburbs are required because you need them to refuel close to home. The vast majority of EVs will just charge at home, so service stations will tend to die off as they are no longer required. The local dairy will pick up the slack of small impulse grocery shops.

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#2625357 22-Dec-2020 10:14

SaltyNZ:

HarmLessSolutions:

See my post #2616663 on the GridServe installation in the UK.

......

The ones that will die off are the local service stations. Service stations in suburbs are required because you need them to refuel close to home. The vast majority of EVs will just charge at home, so service stations will tend to die off as they are no longer required. The local dairy will pick up the slack of small impulse grocery shops.

We have run a Nissan Leaf as a daily commuter since July 2014 and have used the local ChargeNet installation 3 times since then, out of curiosity and when caught short by unexpected extra travel.

The Leaf was originally purchased to better consume our excess PV generation (at a previous property) and we are currently planning to install PV at our current property so we can again 'run our EV on sunshine'. So, not only our own filling station but our own 'oil well' so to speak.

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#2625359 22-Dec-2020 10:17

HarmLessSolutions:

The Leaf was originally purchased to better consume our excess PV generation (at a previous property) and we are currently planning to install PV at our current property so we can again 'run our EV on sunshine'. So, not only our own filling station but our own 'oil well' so to speak.

One day when we have spare money again (hahaha) we will get solar for the same reason.

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frankv

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#2625404 22-Dec-2020 11:21

Geektastic:

Hydrogen is probably more practical in many ways for many users.

Hydrogen, where there's next to no refilling stations, is completely impractical for all but a few users.

The problems with practical storage of hydrogen in sufficient quantity have yet to be solved, whereas battery technology is already practical for many users. And batteries are already on the steep upward slope of the technology S-curve, where relatively small amounts of investment yield big returns in performance. So the gap between batteries and hydrogen will increase in the next few years. Whilst it'll perhaps be 25 years before BEVs replace ICE, it'll be much longer before hydrogen replaces BEVs, if ever. Think VHS vs Betamax.

Obraik

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#2625429 22-Dec-2020 12:10

Geektastic:
I can’t see NZ significantly adopting either in less than 25 years.

With the UK passing a ban on new ICE vehicles from 2030 and Japan looking to do something similar, there simply won't be new RHD ICE vehicles for New Zealanders to buy.

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#2625472 22-Dec-2020 13:29

frankv:
Geektastic:

Hydrogen is probably more practical in many ways for many users.
Hydrogen, where there's next to no refilling stations, is completely impractical for all but a few users.

Trains and freight trucks are early applications. California has a personal transport cars and a few filling stations. Imo the technical problems are overstated.

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#2625475 22-Dec-2020 13:39

gzt:
Trains and freight trucks are early applications. California has a personal transport cars and a few filling stations. Imo the technical problems are overstated.

Trains don't make a lot of sense when most of the line can be electrified - the gaps can be filled with a battery large enough to get between them which is charged as it travels over the electrified portions. In New Zealand, ignoring the fact that most of our intercity transporting should be taken over by trains, hydrogen trucks are quickly becoming irrelevant as well. Something like a Tesla Semi has enough range to cover the legal travel time a truck driver can operate.

The technical problems are quite real.

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#2625500 22-Dec-2020 14:48

Obraik:

Geektastic:
I can’t see NZ significantly adopting either in less than 25 years.

With the UK passing a ban on new ICE vehicles from 2030 and Japan looking to do something similar, there simply won't be new RHD ICE vehicles for New Zealanders to buy.

Japans ban in the mid 2030's is very meek compared to the Uk's, as it continues to allow non plug in hybrids (both mild and full). So large numbers of the likes of the suzuki swift mild hybrid will continue to be available in NZ for decades.

Uk's is a ban on non plug in cars in 2030, and they are going pure electric only from 2035.

In NZ, the labour party campaigned on introducing the clean car standard, which will require importers have a fleet average emissions of 105g co2/km in 2025 (i think) - about 4.5L/100km. This means if say Nissan wants to sell a single high margin Y62 patrol, they will need to make it a heap more efficient, or sell 2.2 Nissan leaf's to protect their average.

Assuming that law gets passed, we are likely to see a lot of EV's for sale by 2025, and cars emitting more than 105g co2/km to carry high price tags as importers try to steer buyers to more efficient cars to protect their fleet averages.

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#2625503 22-Dec-2020 15:03

Yeah I'm sure Japan's ban had some heavy influence from Toyota who's really digging their heels in on doing anything to do with full EVs. Even so, I think the RHD ICE options that will be available will be dramatically reduced by the 2030s.

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